Westminster Politics 2024-2029

Raven said:
It was a diversion, I doubt he ever intended to go ahead with it, just something to steal the headlines whilst they deepened trade links with a genocidal apartheid state.
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Shows how shit a politician he is. People care a lot more about the smoking ban than Arabs being slaughtered.
 

No rise in private school closures in England since Labour’s VAT proposal, data shows​

Since 1987, when data started to be collected, 2,583 schools have opened and 2,674 have shut. In the decade from 2013 to 2023, 847 schools closed – an average of nearly 85 a year.

The 2024 data, which goes up to 6 October, shows that 46 schools have closed, slightly below the average trend, with 77 opening.
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https://www.theguardian.com/educati...osures-england-since-labour-vat-proposal-data
 
Sweet Square said:
Insane framing by the presenter

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Worker​

A person is generally classed as a ‘worker’ if:
  • they have a contract or other arrangement to do work or services personally for a reward (a contract can be written or unwritten)
  • their reward is for money or a benefit in kind, for example the promise of a contract or future work
  • they only have a limited right to send someone else to do the work (subcontract)
  • their employer has to have work for them to do as long as the contract or arrangement lasts
  • they are not doing the work as part of their own limited company in an arrangement where the ‘employer’ is actually a customer or client
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https://www.gov.uk/employment-status/worker
A person who owns the company is not considered as a worker for the company they own.
 
Fully Fledged said:
Can somebody think of the poor landlords.
I honestly don't know how they think they've got a gotcha moment.
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Because landlords genuinely think that they are providing something that no one else can; houses. It's bizarre as feck.
 
Threw a better left hook than John Prescott.
 
So, just to be clear, the people leading labour today are utterly and irredeemably corrupt. I think people have been so worn down by what were basically a criminal gang in charge from Johnson onwards that this stuff just doesn't seem as bad. When mone walked off with a 100 million is this really corrupt?

But it is, and it will lead to disaster.

 
I'm a big believer in spending on public transport but subsidising wealthier pensioners when younger but poorer folk are paying full doesn't make sense to me. I would scrap old age bus passes and use the money to maintain the £2 or hopefully lower, fares for everyone. With a sliding scale, a lot of people who aren't well-off, including the old, live in urban areas and travel less than a mile, 50p for them would be nice.

Frosty said:
Depending on the area many bus passes don't operate at peak times. Certainly not where my folks live.
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Well yeah, some metropolitan areas give bus and train passes at 60, an age when many people are still working. Giving them free travel to work when younger and often much poorer people have to pay wouldn't be right at all.
 
711 said:
I'm a big believer in spending on public transport but subsidising wealthier pensioners when younger but poorer folk are paying full doesn't make sense to me. I would scrap old age bus passes and use the money to maintain the £2 or hopefully lower, fares for everyone. With a sliding scale, a lot of people who aren't well-off, including the old, live in urban areas and travel less than a mile, 50p for them would be nice.



Well yeah, some metropolitan areas give bus and train passes at 60, an age when many people are still working. Giving them free travel to work when younger and often much poorer people have to pay wouldn't be right at all.
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Then let's put pensioners to one side, and we can stick to the point that raising fares by 50% on people who are working and cannot afford the train or where there isn't a train is not great.

The cost has been estimated at £300m a year or thereabouts: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/government-extends-2-bus-fare-cap-and-protects-vital-services.

Not large money in the scope of a £1 trillion budget.

It honestly does not impact urban areas that much, or indeed older people living in large cities given the amount of public transport available.

It has led to a large reduction in rural fares, especially as rural bus services are generally terrible compared to urban ones:


JourneyNormal fareAmount saved% saving
Lancaster to Kendal£14.50£12.5086%
Plymouth to Exeter£11.20£9.2082%
Newcastle to Middlesbrough£8.00£6.0075%
Hull to York£8.50£6.5076%
Leeds to Scarborough£15.00£13.0087%
 
Frosty said:
Then let's put pensioners to one side, and we can stick to the point that raising fares by 50% on people who are working and cannot afford the train or where there isn't a train is not great.

The cost has been estimated at £300m a year or thereabouts: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/government-extends-2-bus-fare-cap-and-protects-vital-services.

Not large money in the scope of a £1 trillion budget.

It honestly does not impact urban areas that much, or indeed older people living in large cities given the amount of public transport available.

It has led to a large reduction in rural fares, especially as rural bus services are generally terrible compared to urban ones:


JourneyNormal fareAmount saved% saving
Lancaster to Kendal£14.50£12.5086%
Plymouth to Exeter£11.20£9.2082%
Newcastle to Middlesbrough£8.00£6.0075%
Hull to York£8.50£6.5076%
Leeds to Scarborough£15.00£13.0087%
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If it were up to me I would spend the £300m. I thought I made it clear I believed in spending on public transport, my point was that if that spending does have to be limited then withdrawing subsidies from wealthier people is one thing that could be done, to maintain the cheaper fares for all that you want.
 
Frosty said:
Then let's put pensioners to one side, and we can stick to the point that raising fares by 50% on people who are working and cannot afford the train or where there isn't a train is not great.

The cost has been estimated at £300m a year or thereabouts: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/government-extends-2-bus-fare-cap-and-protects-vital-services.

Not large money in the scope of a £1 trillion budget.

It honestly does not impact urban areas that much, or indeed older people living in large cities given the amount of public transport available.

It has led to a large reduction in rural fares, especially as rural bus services are generally terrible compared to urban ones:


JourneyNormal fareAmount saved% saving
Lancaster to Kendal£14.50£12.5086%
Plymouth to Exeter£11.20£9.2082%
Newcastle to Middlesbrough£8.00£6.0075%
Hull to York£8.50£6.5076%
Leeds to Scarborough£15.00£13.0087%
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Thats all very interesting and well thought out but you haven’t factored in the imagery black hole Rachel Reeves has in her head.
 
711 said:
If it were up to me I would spend the £300m. I thought I made it clear I believed in spending on public transport, my point was that if that spending does have to be limited then withdrawing subsidies from wealthier people is one thing that could be done, to maintain the cheaper fares for all that you want.
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Sorry I misunderstood your point!
 
Frosty said:
Sorry I misunderstood your point!
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I actually found your points quite refreshing, in that when it comes to rural transport all I usually hear is how bad it is for them when petrol goes up, with no thought to those who can't afford cars in the first place, or can't drive for medical or other reasons. The rural poor are quite a neglected part of society, the wealthy don't care about them and townies like me just look at house prices in lovely place that they will never be able to match and assume everyone there is very well-off.

Anyway, public transport, all for it.
 
How much would it actually cost to just make all buses free of charge?

My view is that we should be trying to take more cars off the road where possible, which means encouraging and incentivising alternatives.
 

Tories: England bus fare cap extension and price rise means '£10 a week extra to get to work under Labour'​

Shadow transport secretary Helen Whately, the Conservative MP for Faversham and Mid Kent, has criticised Keir Starmer’s announcement that the bus fare cap in England was set to be extended for another year, but raised from £2 to £3.

In a post to social media, Whately said:
That’s £10 a week extra to get to work under Labour. Clearly bus users don’t count as “working people” either.
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In December 2022 the then-Conservative government announced that the £2 bus fare cap in England “will run until 31 December 2024.”

In his speech in Birmingham announcing the extension and price rise, the prime minister said “I do know how much this matters, particularly in rural communities where there’s heavy reliance on buses.”
 
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